The invention relates to a card reader for a games machine and especially to a chip card reader that can be used to test the contents of the card in order to enable the user to use it in the games machine or recover it when he wishes to stop playing.
In casinos and as a general rule in gaming rooms, games machines are used that work with coins or tokens that the user purchases at the cashier's desk.
A standard games machine is like the one shown in FIG. 1. It has a body or body-frame 101 provided with a window 102 or a display screen with which the user can be shown the parameters of the game. The machine may have an arm 103 or a control button, not shown, that can be used to start play. For example, this command may cause symbols to flow across the screen. The turn is won if the symbols form a winning combination and if not it is lost.
To be able to start play, the player must put one or more tokens 105 in a paying mechanism 104. When the turn is won, a feeder box 106 releases a certain number of tokens that corresponds, according to the rules of the game, for example to n times the amount of the wager.
The tokens at present are most usually metal tokens which may have different colors and diameters corresponding to different face values. They may also be made of materials of different natures. In order that the payment mechanism 104 may be able to distinguish between them, it is then necessary to use the magnetic signature given by the materials of different natures and/or different dimensions. The old practice of using coins instead of tokens is sometimes still used.
Apart from possible attempts at fraud, the use of tokens is not practical. It calls for the presence of relatively large numbers of staff in a central cashier's desk and accounting operations that could give rise to errors or even fraud. Furthermore, the use of tokens slows down the use of the machine and limits the amount of money that can be wagered.
It can be seen that a more modern system is replacing the use of tokens. However, to avoid upsetting the habits of the players and in order to preserve certain socially convivial aspects of the machine, the use of tokens is not being completely abandoned.
For this purpose, systems of cards such as chip cards are used. The games machine should therefore have a card reader that can read the contents of the card, namely the available sum of money memorized in the card which should be capable of processing the transactions made by the games machine at the user's request and which should be capable, after transaction, of making a recording in the card of the newly available sum.
However, these cards have a certain cost and when the amount of money recorded in the cards has been used up and the cards can no longer be used in their state, the owner of the games machine may need to recover them in order to reuse them.